SGER: Emotional Working Memory: An fMRI Study

Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston MA

Investigators

Abstract

Working memory capacity is associated with activation of information from long term memory for the purposes of completing a current computational task. In the proposed model of emotion generation, emotions are emergent phenomena that are the result of applying complex emotion knowledge from long term memory to core affective feelings. Thus, working memory capacity should be involved in emotion generation, and should be directly related to emotional granularity. To study the role of working memory in the emotion generation process, it is necessary to first determine whether cognitive and emotional tasks operate via distinct systems of working memory. The proposed investigation would be an initial step towards addressing this question. This is a small grant for exploratory research, as part of the behavioral and cognitive science emphasis on cognitive neuroscience.